“The Nashville Symphony has paid off $2.5 million of its restructured $25.3 million debt. … However, with $22.8 million of debt on its books and labor negotiations looming with musicians, there’s still work to be done, including reaching its fundraising goal.”

“[Such trials] are fairly banal legal processes, cases settled by a jury of peers that considers the facts and comes to a conclusion. But these human beings also become, for a period of a few hours, days, or weeks, endowed with a unique power and perspective: critics with the force of law.” Hyperallergic offers a Q&A with a member of the panel that convicted a Florida pastor of selling fake Hirsts.

Built by a programmer named Mike Walker, it’s an extension for Google’s Chrome browser that replaces the word “literally” with “figuratively” on sites and articles across the Web, with deeply gratifying results.

“Assessing his first year in Philadelphia, he wrote, ‘I have not been startled here as often as I would like to have been nor have I felt the energy that is generated by a city where art is important and in ferment.’ But he stayed, and over three decades observed ever-increasing energy, plenty of artistic ferment, and some startling developments.” (includes excerpts)

“The collection, which spans 1896 to 1976, comprises some 3,500 hours of historical footage of major events, notable figures, fashion, travel, sports and culture. It includes extensive film from both World War I and World War II.” And it’s all now in HD, no less.

She adores “the unnerving exhilaration of writing scenes in the middle of the night and handing them to actors at ten o’clock the following morning. The buzz of that is like nothing else. It’s the pressure, and the fact that you are thinking on your feet.”

“As it prepares to re-enter labor negotiations with its musicians, the Nashville Symphony has reduced its debt to less than $23 million, lowered operating expenses by $10 million a year and set a new ticket sales record.”

“Something magical began to happen in us. The yawns turned into smiles of interest. The slumps in the chair turned into leans of anticipation. And by the end of act two, the eye rolls were not directed at me but at certain characters in the play.”

“Why does the Bolshoi matter outside Moscow? Many seasoned balletgoers ultimately prefer the styles of certain Western companies or that of the Mariinsky Ballet of St. Petersburg. Yet your knowledge of ballet is incomplete until you’ve witnessed how the Bolshoi can seem the most red-blooded, exuberant and viscerally stirring of ballet companies.”

“She installed what she called her ‘Rainbow Tribe’ in a 15th-century chateau in the South of France and charged admission to tourists who came to hear them sing, to tour their home, or to watch them play leapfrog in their garden.”

People “who had any type of contact with the criminal justice system were 31 percent more likely than those who had no contact to not obtain medical care when they needed it. Even people who were merely stopped by police were 33 percent more likely to not seek medical care.”

Artist Julian Bell: “At first, the blow seeming so clean and entire, I glimpsed a neat image for it. A rectangle had been punched straight through me and I was an empty frame, the picture gone. And I was struck by the way my fuzzy life had suddenly acquired definition, even if only in negative mode. Now I start to sense the rip is more ragged.”

“As recently as 2008, only 2.9 million LPs were sold in the United States, representing about 0.7 percent of annual album sales, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Last year those sales climbed to 9.4 million, representing 3 percent of all albums, and the independent, off-the-grid nature of many of those sales may mean that vinyl’s numbers are underreported.”

“I think that classical music is always going to be here, as long as there are human beings. But I think that everyone has to think about what is the right way to take care of classical music. It is not the first time when there are problems. I don’t know if there has ever been something which is not called difficult time, in history. I think it’s always time to try to adjust.”

“Franco’s Instagram post came with the comment: ‘Sadly Ben Brantley and the NYT have embarrassed themselves. Brantley is such a little bitch he should be working for Gawker.com instead of the paper of record.'”

“My intention was to put dance, rather than them, in the dock. Instead of writing technically about dance, I wanted them to bring their own highly refined terminology to bear on the form. In this way, both dance and academics would change locations and effect a mutual migration.”

“Colbert is the logical extensions of groundbreaking, neo-absurdist shows like Second City’s ‘Pinata Full of Bees,’ coupled with the arrival on North Wells and North Clark streets of good-looking careerists rather than neo-Brechtian improvisors with much facial hair.”

“Of all the rituals that marked the pre-modern year in Christian Europe, this was the time for the darkest meditations and most intense hopes. This contemplative mood makes the art of Easter far more personal than that of Christmas.”

“[In his novels, he] mythologized the history of an entire continent, while at the same time creating a Rabelaisian portrait of the human condition as a febrile dream in which love and suffering and redemption endlessly cycle back on themselves on a Möbius strip in time.”

From 2005: I’m left-handed, with an ink-smudging overhand hook so exaggerated that my first-grade teacher, who in 1962 was already a thoroughly cranky old woman, tried briefly and vainly to get me to write with ... read more

“In a sensible language like English important words are connected and related to one another by other little words. The Romans in that stern antiquity considered such a method weak and unworthy. Nothing would satisfy ... read more

Opera lovers can be forgiven for imagining the works they love were born in a flash of inspiration. Sometimes the journey is a bit more arduous. The UNCSA Composition Department met with Jennifer Higdon via ... read more

Bill Charlap Trio, Uptown Downtown (Impulse) Pianist Charlap’s trio dazzles the listener from beginning to end of this album. He, bassist Peter Washington and drummer Kenny Washington do not bowl us over ... read more

Julian Bream and Malcolm Arnold talk about Arnold’s Guitar Concerto, Op. 67, then perform its finale, with Arnold conducting members of the Philharmonia Orchestra. This performance was originally telecast by the BBC on November 19, ... read more

A small Degas show, “Drawn in Colour,” at the National Gallery until 7 May, comprises a splendid group of pictures, chiefly on loan from the Burrell Collection, near Glasgow, complemented by some from the National’s ... read more

The ironing board has an iconic status in the history of British theatre. What became known as kitchen-sink drama was more properly ironing-board drama. In 1956, the originality of John Osborne’s Look Back in ... read more

Leonard Bernstein leads the London Symphony in a live performance of Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du printemps, originally telecast by the BBC on November 27, 1966: (This is the latest in a series of arts-related ... read more

Pete Turner, the photgrapher whose work became cover art for dozens of memorable jazz albums,has died at 83. His pictures, including the one above, often appeared on albums of Creed Taylor’s ... read more

In this week’s “Sightings” column, which appeas in the online edition of today’s Wall Street Journal, I take a look at Edward Albee’s art collection, which is being auctioned off next week. Here’s an excerpt. ... read more